The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-05-28
CHOICE SELECTIONS.
MATERIALIsT1c REAsoNINGs,

mATERlALlSTIC KEASONlNGS,
Intellectual assent to doctrines never
translated into practice has indeed
been the worlds favorite method of
evading its higher duties and obliga-
tions in all times. To-day, however,
we are passing beyond the conventional
hypocrisies of our ancestors, and are
actually demolishing edifices which
they at the worst only neglected, while
pretending to venerate. Nothing need
be said here as to the validity or nom
validity of the modern destructive crit
icism. For the purpose of this argu-
ment it is only necessary to record the
fact of its development, and to consider
its effects upon contemporary thought
and conduct. 1t must be reckoned with
as one of the agencies which are mold
ing the age for good or for evil. The
general reasoning upon it is crude but
practical. If, it is argued, this is the
only life to be lived, then it can be made
worth living only by gratifying every
impulse and indulging every desire
which can be gratified and INDUCED,
without outraging the rights of others
so much as to expose us to their active
enmity or interference. No doubt this
is false theory of life from any point
of view; as false from that of the athe-
ist as from that of the Christian. But
the many are not philosophers, and it
seems to them reasonable and just,
and they put it in practice to the
best of their ability, if with sorry
enough results. Their failure to make
make it answer their expectations un-
fortunately suggests to them the sus-
picion that the fault lies in the existing
order of things, which they easily per-
suade themselves has been arranged
entirely to suit the prosperous. A nat
ural sequence of such reflections is i'm
patience with, then hatred OF, and finally
desire to overthrow the system sup
posed to have such drawbacks. Mater
ialism encourages the lust of possession,
and sharpens the zeal for the use and
abuse of power. Before the war of the
rebellion, Southern statesman once
observed in public address: 1.-THE poor
will not always consent to remain poor,
with the ballot in their hands," Per-
haps there was some touch of prophetic
insight in that observation. Certainly
the march of materialism seems to be
bringing us daily nearer to period
when the question suggested may be
forced upon the consideration of the
country. A materialist civilization can
never be safe one. When it appears
most prosperous and firmly established,
it may be undermined and tottering to
its fall; for it must rest rather upon
the common greed than the common
sense Of justice, and the more demo-
cratic its system the greater will be its
danger. Wealth and all that it implies
cannot be an efficient substitute for
those higher tendencies which expand
the mind while subduing the passions
which teach the inferiority of pursuits
and desires bounded by the narrow
space of OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES; which lend
to the doctrine of human brotherhood
a meaning and force it cannot derive
from mere philosophy and which
afford compensation for the trials of
circumstance and condition in giving
to those who follow them content
ment independent of fortune and hope
beyond the reach of human vicissitude.
George Frederic Parsons, IN the allan
TIC Monthly.